"I am the image, that final clue.I know only this lab, where light can simmer for days,coaxing shadows to slowly definethe tiny drop you tip so carefully onto the end of a twisted paperclip. The lab, and you, squinting into the lensof a machine you developedhydrogen gas pumped through a salt solution on the fulcrum between question and discovery."
"In the lab, the men call you names, mock your clothes, your moods, your lips, unpainted. Your delight, your choice of gardenia is science. Not on the first but the fifty-first iteration,I come to youin the honey of crystallographyamid x-rays splattered off a fiber of wet DNA like a tadpole on a sliver of glass. I swim up, rapt, to visibility.I whisper my secret only to you,"
Sexist hostility pervades a laboratory where a female scientist endures mockery of her clothes, moods, and appearance while performing delicate experiments. Light and careful technique coax microscopic drops into X-ray crystallography images that reveal molecular structure. After many iterations, a decisive image appears from X-rays scattering off a fiber of wet DNA, providing the crucial clue to hereditary code. The image links molecular form to traits such as whale song, peacock feathers, earlobe and pea plant variation. The poem addresses Rosalind Franklin directly, portraying her image and work as the discovery itself and a rightful laureate.
Read at www.scientificamerican.com
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